The Hubble as a hobbit: Lecture on famous telescope coming to Longway Planetarium

FLINT, MI -- The Longway Planetarium is holding a lecture on the Hubble Telescope May 23 titled, "There and Back Again: An Astronomer's Tale."

Guest lecturer Dr. Rajib Ganguly of the University of Michigan-Flint will "recount his love affair" with the telescope that has helped shape his career at 6 p.m. and lead a Q&A following the lecture.

In a release from Longway, the famous telescope is described as having many similarities with hobbits, the fictional people that populate J.R.R. Tolkein's "Lord of the Rings" novels.

"Much like a hobbit-hole, it too has a perfectly round door like a
porthole that opens to a tube-shaped tunnel, and like hobbit, the Hubble
is fond of visitors. Not just astronauts that have come to service it
and give it new life, but also to astronomers who employ it, peering out
into farthest depths of universe and to close-by neighboring planets,
and everything in between," the release reads.